Trying to fit into the shell of who i used to be. Part 1.

you get a strange feeling

when you’re about to leave a place

I told him, like you’ll not only miss the people you love

but you’ll miss the person you are now at this time

and this place, because you’ll never be this way ever again.

                           

[Reading Lolita in Tehran] 

After having a kid, it is pretty common for one to lose a sense of self.  I sat with a friend last night, drinking a girly adult drink, sadly giggling while reminiscing over how "we used to be so fun."  It's a very common theme among my friends these days. it's not that we're not fun, its just that the meaning of fun goes through a little evolution process when you have someone other than yourself you have to care for 24/7.  

We opted on a late showing of the movie, 'Bad Moms,' (how fitting) and had serious reservations over whether we would be passed out before the movie actually played: Mom Life. 

Masking serious doubts  with smiles, I conceded that I felt as if I were the shell of someone I used to be. It's an odd feeling to be in my later 20's (26 to be exact) mirroring the same questions about my identity that I went through a decade ago.  I once lived my life with such confidence.  Though often penniless, I often felt a sense of power merely for existing and being in a place of my choosing. I might not have felt beautiful, but the absence of the standard of beauty placed on me by society didn't burden me.  I might not have felt good enough, but inadequacy wasn't a haunting figure looming over me on a day to day basis, with Elmo songs as the background music.  

This isn't actually all just babble, did you know a woman's brain actually changes when they become a mother? neurologists have discovered that, "Even before a woman gives birth, pregnancy tinkers with the very structure of her brain [...] After centuries of observing behavioral changes in new mothers, scientists are only recently beginning to definitively link the way a woman acts with what's happening in her prefrontal cortex, midbrain, parietal lobes, and elsewhere. Gray matter becomes more concentrated. Activity increases in regions that control empathy, anxiety, and social interaction. On the most basic level, these changes, prompted by a flood of hormones during pregnancy and in the postpartum period, help attract a new mother to her baby. In other words, those maternal feelings of overwhelming love, fierce protectiveness, and constant worry begin with reactions in the brain." (Adrienne LaFrance) - it only makes sense that when neurological changes like that takes place, it would shake a person from their core, even without their routine being disrupted.   

I remember reading about the ship of Theseus years ago in my Greek Mythology class in college.  Plutarch wrote extensively on it- essentially, Theseus, the king of Athens, and a bunch of youth from Athens traveled from Crete- and the ship was preserved for years and years after, while constantly being replaced with new timber as the planks would decay.  Eventually, the ship of Theseus was gradually replaced piece by piece, over time.   The ship of Theseus was referred to as the "Theseus paradox" eventually, because it posed the question- if all the components of an object (or person) are changed, is it still the same? 

Herein lies my doubts: now that Mother is the front runner of my identity, is this just a component of my identity or does my personhood fall under the shadow of this? There has been a lot of reluctance from me in my parenting journey, to embrace what is in front of me, when I have been mourning the life that is behind me.  I don't know why change and growth is met with such resistance.  Maybe the great problem in all of this, is that I am the one who has refused to change though circumstance and opportunity have demanded that I do so.   

Perhaps I only lack perspective.  In the midst of the redundancy of mundane tasks, it's often impossible to see where any glory could possibly be found.  

I want to contribute to great change in the world, but I am consumed with cleaning dishes, trying to not be late, and constantly trying to remedy the fact that I've ran out of milk and diapers- again.  

I want to  spew out poetry and write meaningful things, but I can't even remember to write down doctor appointments.

  I want to feel beautiful again, but im also trying to teach my son that even though the body is a temple, wrapping paper always gets thrown away and a persons beauty has nothing to do with symmetry on a face or a number on a scale and to believe otherwise is toxic.  

so this is where I'm at, today.  I've labeled this part 1, because I know this is just the beginning of this thought.
I'm sorry to finish this so abruptly, and that I can't finish this off with an anecdotal story or resolution today.   I'm writing this out so I can process this, and I'm nowhere near ready to figure this out.  But, I will post updates as they come.   If this comes across as depressing- I'm sorry, I assure you that I am not depressed, I'm just trying to be transparent.